“I’m sure I saw something sliding away into the water,” added Greaves, the botanist, “but it didn’t look in the least like a snake.”
The shadow of the old man’s death lay on our little cabin conference that night, inhibiting speech, though the means of it remained a mystery. It was not until I told my tale that there was any conversation at all. As I finished there was a little moment of silence, during which each one made the obvious parallel between the occurrence and the death of Makoi Toa, and then Professor Hertford asked to see my sketch. He looked at it closely for a moment.
“Unless I am mistaken, gentlemen,” he said, “we are facing an unknown organism of serious potentialities. May I ask that you do not go ashore to-morrow unless you are well armed and in pairs?”
“What is it, pr
